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If the threshold Russia established is not high enough to merit a total ban from an Olympic Games, then that’s a remarkable precedent to set. And if the IOC doesn’t ban Russia, it will be political.

The IOC is running out of time to come up with a decision regarding whether or not to ban Russian athletes from the Rio Olympics in the face of a massive doping scandal. (YURI KADOBNOV / AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

You have to hand it to Russia: they earned it. They erected and maintained a state-sponsored doping system that hid the positive tests of athletes from track and field, to hockey, to swimming, to table tennis, to curling. (Curling!) They doped everywhere from the Olympics to the Paralympics to the world university games. They used the former KGB, directed by highly placed Russian government officials. That’s some comprehensive hustle, boy.

It would be quite something if this happened without the knowledge and at least tacit approval of Vladimir Putin, by the way. That would certainly show a lot of initiative.

And now it’s been dumped on the gilded doorstep of the International Olympic Committee, which is in the uncomfortable position of having to take a stand. Banning Russia from the 2016 Olympics in Rio seems the obvious path, and a decision will come Sunday. The World Anti-Doping Agency’s comprehensive report on Russia’s doping system from 2011 to 2015 recommended such a ban. Anti-doping leaders from 14 countries signed a letter supporting a ban, including the United States and Canada. The IOC said it would wait on an appeal from Russian athletes to the Court of Arbitration for Sport on Thursday: that appeal was denied.

At least one English newspaper is saying a ban is coming.

Still, nobody could be certain. The IOC initially said they would ban Russian sports officials and any officials named in the scandal from Rio, which, well, obviously. They said they would “explore the legal options with regard to a collective ban of all Russian athletes for the Olympic Games 2016 versus the right to individual justice.” Sure.

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But there did not seem, at least, to be a surplus of evident will. Individual justice is important, but how in the world do you allow a Russian athlete to compete in Rio? Russia finished third in overall medals in the London Olympics with 79, and fourth in gold medals with 22. If the threshold Russia established is not high enough to merit a total ban from an Olympic Games, it’s a remarkable precedent to set.

A total ban for doping has never happened before; this is a Rubicon for the IOC. As USA Today noted, there is no specific provision for penalizing state-sponsored doping programs in the charter of either WADA or the IOC. Which, if you consider WADA is an underfunded organization that relies disproportionately on the nations involved to oversee their anti-drug programs, seems like rather a large hole in the net.

But if the IOC doesn’t ban Russia, it will be political. Nobody seemed to want to do this in the first place. The New York Times reported that WADA delayed any meaningful response to Russian doping for years, even after whistle-blowing in 2010 and 2012. In 2012, Russian discus thrower Darya Pishchalnikova wrote to WADA confessing, and offering to name names; WADA sent her e-mail to Russian sports officials. There was a six-month delay in naming Canadian lawyer Richard McLaren as the lead investigator for the WADA report, after Dick Pound’s initial WADA report that concluded Russia was cheating. It took bombshell media work to push this forward. This whole thing has been tentative from the start.

But now the evidence seems clear. The International Paralympic Committee opened suspension proceedings against Russia on Friday. The IOC could still abdicate responsibility and hand over the decisions to individual sporting federations, some of whom — ahem, swimming — seem hostile to the idea of a blanket ban. But why, after everything, would that even be a consideration?

Well, if you ban Russia, you are opening the door to this happening elsewhere. You are opening the door to a future Olympics without, say, Kenyan marathoners (Kenya’s anti-doping program was declared non-compliant in May, but has been allowed to remain on a monitoring list). Or Jamaican sprinters (Jamaica’s entire anti-doping board resigned in 2013 after a spate of positive tests, which the country’s senior drug tested called the tip of the iceberg; it was alleged that Jamaica had carried out a single out-of-competition test in the six months leading up to the London Olympics).

What if you had to ban China, the host for 2022? The primary accredited Beijing lab was suspended by WADA earlier this year, and The Times of London reported in March that a whistleblower claimed five positive tests in swimming had been covered up, but that contacting WADA was difficult “due to state surveillance.” Long-time Olympic observers have claimed China and Russia both learned from the old Soviet ways.

For that matter, in 2003 the former head of the US Olympic Committee’s drug control unit alleged to Sports Illustrated that the USOC had covered up over 100 positive drugs tests between 1988 and 2000, and that he had documents to prove it.

It can happen anywhere. The Russians were just more flagrant, and ham-fisted. If Russia competes it will be a disgrace, but one that fits within the context of global disgraces. WADA is limited, and reliant on others. Banning one country opens a door that, for an organization that depends on people believing in the integrity of a biannual global television program, can become existential pretty fast.

On Friday morning the IOC announced that retested samples from the Beijing and London Olympics showed 45 more athletes had tested positive for PEDs; 23 were medallists. The Olympics never end. The IOC must see to that.

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